Various vehicles and industries, including those involving coal-fired electrical power generation, wood processing, and oil and gas production, produce nitrogen oxide gases (e.g., NO, N2O, NO2, and N2O4). Nitrogen oxides (collectively referred to as NOx), and particularly, nitrogen dioxide, are primary air pollutants and among the most common toxic pollutants generated on earth. The continual generation of such materials provokes considerable interest in the development of efficient, cost effective technologies to remediate NOx-containing emissions such as in flue gas scrubbing operations, in protection based operations such as those required by workers, or for sensitive equipment.
Emergency workers such as first responders and clean-up workers require protection against nitrogen oxide gases due to its common production from combustion/fires. The common respirators available to these individuals, which typically rely on activated carbon as a filtration media, provide relatively poor protection and removal capabilities for these gasses. Some improvement has been observed by the use of zeolites and titania. These materials, however, suffer from several drawbacks.
As such, there is a need for improved materials capable of removing or sequestering nitrogen dioxide. The inclusion of such materials in filtration apparatuses or safety systems such as breathing apparatuses is greatly desired.